Apple 'James Grieve' - Cordon, 8L pot

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'James Grieve' Dessert Apple Tree - Cordon, 8L Pot

James Grieve - the traditional and trusted apple tree variety with heavy, regular crops of savoury fruits with an appetising appearance. The fruits are ready to be harvested in September, and have yellow-green, reddish orange speckled skin with firm juicy flesh. The taste of the apples is quite acidic in taste at first, but this mellows as the fruits mature in September. The flesh softens soon after and is somewhat like a firm pear in texture. In cooking, the fruits retain their shape. James Grieve is one of the best mid-season, heavy cropper apple varieties of excellent flavour and appetising appearance. 'James Grieve' has been awarded the Award of Garden Merit given by the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS), which helps gardeners make informed choices about plants.

A: Not As Much As You Might Think...One stand out specification that customers often use to judge the value of a tree is the height.So should height directly correlate with the price of a tree? No, not necessarily.To an extent the height of a tree can give you a good indication of its maturity but you must not forget: To grow a productive, well shaped, healthy tree you must prune it back regularly, especially when young.Our trees often grow up to 2m in the fields before we prune them back and package them ready to send out. This pruning encourages the tree to grow more, stronger branches and ensures there is a good balance between the root size and top growth. This ensures that your tree puts energy into establishing a healthy root base instead of supporting top growth, providing a better foundation for your tree in the future.So, in summary: Don’t let the extra 10/20cm you may find elsewhere sway you. You are likely to be paying extra for the delivery costs and, if you want a healthy tree in the long run, you’re going to have to chop it off anyway!

Caring and Maintenance

Water young trees regularly until roots are well established. Trim annually from mid to late summer. Apply some fertilizer in spring in order to promote healthy growth and a good crop. Optionally, mulch in spring. Check tree ties regularly and loosen any if necessary to avoid rubbing of the stems.

Planting

Planting Distance: 2.4m - 3.6m with 4.5m between rows

Suited to almost all well-drained and moderately fertile soils with pH between 6.5 and 7.5 in a sheltered, full sun location. Before planting your tree, clean up all wandering weeds and keep a clean ring around the tree base. Water well during the first year until well established.

Autumn is the best season for planting fruiting trees, as the soil moisture and heat allow easier and faster root establishment and regeneration of damaged root systems.

Pollination

Pollination Group: 3

Fruit trees will only produce fruit if their flowers have been pollinated. This is usually done by flying insects such as honey bees, bumblebees, flies, wasps etc. This tree is not self pollinating so it therefore requires another tree nearby of the same fruit species, but of a different variety, that flowers during the same period. The two trees will have to be near each other for the pollination process to be successful. The general consensus is that the two trees should be within 18m (55ft) of each other. To make things slightly easier fruit trees are categorised into different pollination groups. Just remember that the fruit must be of the same species but of a different variety; only an apple tree can pollinate another apple tree. However, if you buy two of these 'James Grieve' trees they will not pollinate each other.

The pollination groups are numbered 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 or 6, according to flowering time. Best results will be obtained if one variety is planted near another apple tree of the same group. In the UK, because of our longer spring, you can also choose a partner from a group on either side (so an ideal pollination partner for group 3 would be one in group 2, 3 or 4).

Fruit Benefits

These fruits taste best when freshly picked from their branches. They please even the most sophisticated of palates, and can be made into jams and preserves to bring great summer memories on autumn or winter days. Fruit plants are a valuable addition to any garden, bearing in mind that they do not only provide fruits, but also make a bold statement in garden arrangements by producing clouds of pink and white flowers, which at the slightest breeze fall like raindrops. When planning your garden, try to choose varieties with fruits that ripen from early summer to late autumn to ensure a constant supply of fresh fruits throughout the warmer months.

Fruit Tree Rootstocks

Fruit trees are generally budded or grafted onto a rootstock by the nursery, this means the roots of the tree are a different plant to the trunk, branches and fruit. Effectively sticking two plants together, one that has good roots and one that has good fruit, ensures that you get what you pay for. Plants raised from seed will vary from the parent plants and there will be a wide variation in the size or shape of a tree and the quality and quantity of fruit it produces. Another result of budding and grafting a variety onto selected rootstocks is the ability to control the size of the tree to a certain degree. However, the size that a fruit tree ultimately grows to is dependent on a number of factors:

The fruit variety ( i.e. Apple Braeburn)

How it’s pruned

Soil type

Position

Its rootstock

Some varieties of tree are naturally more vigorous than others, so this will affect how much they grow each year. For instance a Bramley Apple seedling will naturally grow bigger than a Cox’s Orange Pippin Apple seedling. The correct pruning will also help to control the size of tree, as well as encouraging it to produce flower buds from which fruit develop.

Where you grow your fruit tree and the soil it is growing in also impacts on its ability to grow and thus eventual size. Most fruit trees need a good amount of sunshine to grow well and for the fruit to ripen with high sugar content. Trees growing in cold, open spots will grow slower than those that are protected and warm. The same is true for the soil, with trees growing in light sandy soils generally growing more slowly and not reaching such a large size as those in rich fertile soils which will be more vigorous and taller growing.

RHS Award of Garden Merit

The Award of Garden Merit or AGM is an award made to garden plants by the British Royal Horticultural Society after a period of assessment by the appropriate committees of the Society. Awards are made annually after plant trials (which may last for one or more years, depending on the type of plant being trialled) at RHS Garden, Wisley and other RHS gardens, or after observation of plants in specialist collections. This is intended to judge the plants' performance for conditions in the UK.